Sibold and May took each other's hands, and they went round the place together, looking at everything.
Presently May said, in a whisper:
"Oh, Sibold, this place is so nice, I wonder if there is any Parsley here."
"Why do you want Parsley?" he asked.
"Because if there was a nice bed of Parsley we might be able to find a Baby - And oh, Sibold, I do so want a Baby."
"Very well then, let us look," said her brother. "There seems to be every kind of plant here; and if there is every kind of plant, you know there must be Parsley." For Sibold was very logical.
So the two children went all round the grassy dell searching; and presently, sure enough, under the spreading leaves of a Citron they found a great bed of Parsley - bigger Parsley than they had ever seen before.
Sibold was quite pleased with it, and said, "This is something like Parsley. Do you know, May, it always puzzled me how a Baby who is so much bigger than the Parsley can be hidden by it; and it must be hidden in it, for I often go out to look in the bed at home, and I never can find one, although nurse always finds one whenever she looks. But she does not look nearly often enough. I know if I was as lucky as she is, I would be always looking."
May found the longing to find a baby grow so strong upon her that she said again:
"Oh, Sibold, I do so long for a Baby; I hope we will find one."
As she spoke there was a queer kind of sound heard - a sort of very, very soft laugh - like a smile set to music.
May was surprised, and, for a moment, did not think of doing anything; she merely pointed, and said:
"Look, look!"
Sibold ran forward, and lifted up the leaf of an enormous Parsley plant; and there - oh, joy of joys! - was lying the dearest little Baby Boy that ever was seen.
May knelt down beside him, and lifted him up, and began to rock him, and sing "Hush a bye, baby," whilst Sibold looked on complacently. However, after a while he got impatient, and said:
"Look here, you know, I found that Baby; he belongs to me."
"Oh, please," said May, "I heard him first. He is mine."
"He is mine," said Sibold; "He is mine," said May; and both began to get a little angry.
Suddenly they heard a low groan - a sort of sound like as if a tune had a toothache. Both children looked down in alarm, and saw that the poor Baby was dead.
They were both horrorstruck, and began to cry; and both asked the other to forgive them, and promised that never, never again they would be angry. When they had done this, the Child opened its eyes, looked at them gravely, and said:
"Now never quarrel or be angry. If you get angry again, either of you, I shall be dead, aye, and buried too, before you can say 'trapsticks.'"
"Indeed, Ba," said May, "I shall never, never be angry again. At least, I shall try not to be."
Said Sibold:
"I assure you, sir, that under no provocation, resulting from whatever concatenation of circumstances, shall I be guilty of the malfaisance of anger."
"How pretty he speaks," said May; and the Baby nodded his head to him familiarly, as much as to say:
"All right, old man, we understand each other."
Then for a while they were all quite quiet. Presently the Baby turned its blue eyes up to May, and said:
"Please, little mother, will you sing to me?"
"What would you like, Ba?" said May.
"Oh, any little trifle; something pathetic," he answered.
"Any particular style?" asked May.
"No, thank you; anything that comes handy. I prefer something simple - some little elementary trifle, as, for instance, any little tune beginning with a chromatic scale in consecutive fifths and octaves, pianissimo - rallentando - excellerando - crescendo - up to an inharmonic change on the dominant of the diminished flat ninth."
"Oh, please, Ba," said May, very humbly, "I do not know anything about that yet. I am only in scales, and, if you please, I do not know what it is all about."
"Look, and you will see," said the Child, and he took a piece of stick and wrote some music on the sand.
"I do not know yet," said May.
Just then a small yellowish-brown animal appeared in the glade chasing a rat. When it came opposite them it suddenly went off like the sound of a pistol.
"Do you know now?" asked the Child.
"No, dear Ba, but it does not matter," she answered.
"Very well, dear," said the Child, kissing her, "anything you please, only let it come straight from your loving little heart;" and he kissed her again.
Then May sang something very sweet and pretty - so sweet and pretty that it made her cry, and Sibold also, and the Baby. She did not know the words, and she did not know the tune, and she had only a vague sort of idea what it was all about; but it was very, very pretty. All the time she was singing she kept nursing the baby, and he put his dear little fat arms round her neck, and loved her very much.
When she was done singing, the Child said:
"Chlap, Chlap, Chlap, M-chlap!"
"What does he mean?" she asked Sibold, in distress, for she saw that the Baby wanted something.